Obama won both Indiana and North Carolina, for instance, and, on a more precise level, he prevailed in a couple dozen swing districts where voters also chose to re-elect their incumbent GOP congressmen.

After his annual August bus tour to help re-elect House Republicans, Mr. Boehner will spend a short vacation next week at his house in West Chester, Ohio, where he'll relax by cutting his lawn with something not often seen on Martha's Vineyard: a Toro push mower.

• After failing to win the GOP presidential nomination, Ron Paul will not run as a third-party candidate because that would put his son, Rand Paul, in an untenable position: Does the Republican senator from Kentucky support his father and effectively re-elect Mr. Obama, or back his party and defeat him?